President’s Message Dec 2017
By Phil Orenstein
This is a post-election message to look into the results, and more importantly to thank each of you for your courage, faith, and hope for a brighter future in America for our children and the next generation.
We campaigned and fought a valiant battle to wake up people from their apathy and ignorance. We united together for a great cause: the fundamental right in America for “we the people” to have our voices heard, to exercise our right to vote, and elect genuine capable leaders to represent us in our city government. We campaigned hard and should be proud of our efforts. We fought so that “government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth,” recalling the words of our first Republican and one of our greatest American presidents, Abraham Lincoln.
Friends,
I must admit I have never in my life purchased a ticket to a sports event. I am not a sports enthusiast. But I am an American black citizen, and I have had it up to the gills with black people who embrace victimhood. I also highly resent my being expected to do the same in order to affirm my “blackness.”
On November 7, New Yorkers will vote on two ballot referenda: Proposition 1 for a state Constitutional Convention, and Proposition 2, a Constitutional Amendment that would deny pensions to politicians convicted of certain crimes.
The city’s statues and monuments are being threatened with elimination, including the iconic Christopher Columbus statue at Columbus Circle, since Mayor de Blasio formed an advisory commission to “address monuments seen as oppressive.” Now a throng of vandals has appeared defacing our monuments, including the Christopher Columbus statue in Central Park which was vandalized, the destruction of the statue of Francis Scott Key, who wrote our beloved National Anthem, and many others. 